Moritz Güdemann ( he, משה גידמן; 19 February 1835 – 5 August 1918) was an Austrian

rabbi A rabbi () is a spiritual leader or religious teacher in Judaism. One becomes a rabbi by being ordained by another rabbi – known as ''semikha'' – following a course of study of Jewish history and texts such as the Talmud. The basic form of ...

and historian. He served as chief rabbi of Vienna.

Biography

Moritz (Moshe) Güdemann attended the Jewish school in Hildesheim, and thereafter went to a Catholic ''Gymnasium''. He was educated at the University of Breslau (Ph.D. 1858), and took his rabbinical diploma (1862) at the newly founded Jewish Theological Seminary there. In the latter year he was called to the rabbinate of

Magdeburg Magdeburg (; nds, label= Low Saxon, Meideborg ) is the capital and second-largest city of the German state Saxony-Anhalt. The city is situated at the Elbe river. Otto I, the first Holy Roman Emperor and founder of the Archdiocese of Mag ...

; in 1866 he went to

Vienna en, Viennese , iso_code = AT-9 , registration_plate = W , postal_code_type = Postal code , postal_code = , timezone = CET , utc_offset = +1 , timezone_DST ...

as preacher, where he became rabbi in 1868, and chief rabbi in 1892. He married his first wife, Fanny Spiegel, in 1863. After her death he married Ida Sachs, with whom he had four children.

On Zionism

Güdemann protested the proposal to strike from the prayer-book all passages referring to the return of the Jews to the

Holy Land The Holy Land; Arabic: or is an area roughly located between the Mediterranean Sea and the Eastern Bank of the Jordan River, traditionally synonymous both with the biblical Land of Israel and with the region of Palestine. The term "Ho ...

(compare his sermon "Jerusalem, die Opfer und die Orgel," 1871). He threatened to resign over this issue. There are conflicting versions of his support for

Theodor Herzl Theodor Herzl; hu, Herzl Tivadar; Hebrew name given at his brit milah: Binyamin Ze'ev (2 May 1860 – 3 July 1904) was an Austro-Hungarian Jewish lawyer, journalist, playwright, political activist, and writer who was the father of modern pol ...

Zionist Zionism ( he, צִיּוֹנוּת ''Tsiyyonut'' after '' Zion'') is a nationalist movement that espouses the establishment of, and support for a homeland for the Jewish people centered in the area roughly corresponding to what is known in J ...

schemes. Herzl wrote that Güdemann believed his book ''

Der Judenstaat ''Der Judenstaat'' (German, literally ''The State of the Jews'', commonly rendered as ''The Jewish State'') is a pamphlet written by Theodor Herzl and published in February 1896 in Leipzig and Vienna by M. Breitenstein's Verlags-Buchhandlung. It ...

'' could "work wonders," but Güdemann later denied this and dissociated himself from any nationalist interpretation of the Bible and its promise of Jewish redemption.

Published works

Güdemann wrote on the history of Jewish education and culture, and was associated with the

Wissenschaft des Judentums "''Wissenschaft des Judentums''" (Literally in German the expression means "Science of Judaism"; more recently in the US it started to be rendered as "Jewish Studies" or "Judaic Studies," a wide academic field of inquiry in American Universities) ...

movement. In addition to dozens of articles, he published the following monographs: Wachstein, Bernhard. "Bibliographie der Schriften Moritz Güdemanns" ''Bericht der Israelitischen Allianz zu Wien'' (1931) * ''"Die Geschichte der Juden in Magdeburg,"'' 1865 * ''"Die Neugestaltung des Rabbinenwesens,"'' 1866 * ''"Sechs Predegten,"'' 1867 * ''"Jüdisches im Christenthum des Reformationszeitalters,"'' 1870 * ''"Jüdisches Unterrichtswesen Während der Spanisch-Arabischen Periode,"'' 1873 * ''"Religionsgeschichtliche Studien,"'' 1876 * ''"Geschichte des Erziehungswesens und der Kultur der Abendländischen Juden,"'' 3 vols., 1880–88 * ''"Nächstenliebe,"'' 1890 * ''"Quellenschriften zur Gesch. des Unterrichts und der Erziehung bei den Deutschen Juden,"'' 1894 * ''"Das Judenthum in Seinen Grundzügen und nach Seinen Geschichtlichen Grundlagen Dargestellt,"'' 1902 * ''"Das Judenthum im Neutestamentlichen Zeitalter in Christlicher Darstellung,"'' 1903.

References

External links

Guedemann Sermons
Over 600 of Guedemann's sermons have been digitized by the

Leo Baeck Institute, New York The Leo Baeck Institute New York (LBI) is a research institute in New York City dedicated to the study of German-Jewish history and culture, founded in 1955. It is one of three independent research centers founded by a group of German-speaking ...

. (German)
Aus Meinem Leben
Guedemann's memoir has been digitized by the Leo Baeck Institute, NY. (German)
Guide to the Moritz Guedemann Collection
at the

.
Entry in the Jewish Encyclopedia

Moritz Güdemann: Rabbi, Historian and Apologist
by Ismar Schorsch, in Leo Baeck Institute Yearbook (1966) 11 (1): 42-66. doi: 10.1093/leobaeck/11.1.42 {{DEFAULTSORT:Guedemann, Moritz 1835 births 1918 deaths 19th-century German rabbis Austro-Hungarian rabbis 20th-century Austrian rabbis Chief rabbis of Vienna Chief rabbis of Austria People from Hildesheim